Seeking Solace in the Game : Twins Who Left War-Torn Nicaragua Discover a New Life Playing Baseball, Football at Estancia

Back then, Pedro and Jairo Arceyut didn’t fully understand why the military jets flew over the little sandlot baseball diamond just outside Managua, Nicaragua.

Back then, they didn’t understand reasons for the gunfire they heard in the distance at night. Or why the troops, including boys just a few years older than them, marched by and sometimes never came back.

They were too young to understand. All they knew was that there was a war . . . and they were scared.

“There was a lot of stuff going on,” said Jairo, looking at his twin brother, Pedro. “I was happy when we left.”

Pedro nodded.

“I was happy too,” he says. “It was nice when we came over here.”

The identical twins left the war-torn Central American country in 1985. They have never returned, although they hope to after they graduate from Estancia High School next year.

Although it has taken some time, the boys have adjusted to life in their new surroundings. They live with their uncle and aunt, Manuel and Inez Guido, in a small home in Costa Mesa. Both are good students and have played key roles a surprising 8-3 start by Estancia’s baseball team.

Leaving Nicaragua wasn’t easy, though. Inez and Manuel Guido had raised the boys in Managua and brought them to Costa Mesa when the civil war escalated in the mid-1980s.

“We were getting older,” Pedro said, “and our mom and my aunt didn’t want us to get drafted in to the military.”

Pedro and Jairo were 9 years old when they left.

Estancia baseball Coach Paul Troxel poked his head out of the tool shed near the baseball field one summer night in 1986.

He was greeted with leather-and-stitches facial, courtesy of a Jairo Arceyut fastball. Or was it thrown by Pedro?

Troxel couldn’t tell which one.

Still dazed from being grazed by the ball, Troxel thought he was seeing double--two identical 10-year-old Little League boys looking back at him.

They were grinning.

“I thought I was seeing a family of four,” Troxel said. “They were warming up for a Little League game, and I was coming out of the shed after one of our summer league games. I guess one of them threw one, and it got away.”

Pedro and Jairo had been in the United States less than a year when Troxel first met them. Everything was new to them at the time.

School, a three-hour day in Nicaragua, was suddenly six. New classmates. A new language.

“It was weird,” Pedro said. “We had recess. We never had that before. We had a lunch hour, too.”

Baseball helped the brothers adjust, just as it helped them survive the tough times in Nicaragua.

The twins played pickup games with their friends in Managua or when they visited their grandmother, who lived just outside the city.

Both boys idolized one of their uncles, Manuel Ayala, who starred in a local semipro league along with future Montreal Expo Dennis Martinez, who pitched a perfect game against the Dodgers in July 1991.

“We went to all of my uncle’s games,” Jairo said. “He was the one who taught us sports. He was one of the best players in the league.

“We used to call him Dad. We still do. We’ve always thought of him as our dad.”

The boys haven’t seen their natural father, Salvador Arceyut, since they left Nicaragua. He had spent some time in the military. They say they don’t know where he is now.

Their mother, Milteda, lives in Miami with her son, Eddie, 14, and daughter Norma, 9. The twins visited their mother, brother and sister two years ago.

“We didn’t grow up with them,” Pedro said of his family. “Our parents were divorced when we were young, and we were split from them.”

Said Jairo: “Our mom was only 17 when she had us. I guess she thought she couldn’t handle us. We were twins. So my aunt and uncle have taken care of us.”

Manuel and Inez Guido adopted the twins during their freshman year at Estancia. Although their adopted name is Guido, they still list themselves on the Estancia lineup card as Arceyut.

The boys began playing baseball when they were young. Equipment was scarce. They started with wooden sticks and eventually graduated to bats. They borrowed their uncle’s equipment at every opportunity.

They used tennis balls when they didn’t have a baseball. When they didn’t have a tennis ball, they used tightly wound old socks around a rolled-up one. A makeshift ball.

The baseball games were a daily events--before school, after school, whenever. On the weekends, the adults joined in.

“Every Saturday we would play,” Jairo said. “It was tradition. People from everywhere would come and play. Grown-ups, kids, everybody.”

But beyond the outfield fence, the brothers were constantly reminded of the problems their friends, family and country faced.

Widespread protests against the Somoza family, which had ruled the country since the mid-1930s, began to surface in the late 1970s. Many of the opponents belonged to the Sandinista National Liberation Front.

The conflict grew into a civil war, eventually forcing Somoza to resign, and the Sandinista Party took control of the country.

In 1981, the United States, charging that Nicaragua was providing weapons to other Central American rebels, cut off aid to the country and began supporting Contras who were fighting the government.

At the time, the Arceyuts were too young to understand the politics. But they did have a frightening view of another side of the war--from their own back yard.

Only a strong outfield throw from the sandlot they played on stood a military bunker.

Pedro and Jairo helped their grandmother build it in front of her house as a precautionary measure, just in case the gunfire in the distance drew closer. Before building the bunker, when the gunfire drew close, the family pulled the mattress off a bed and hid under it.

Every house, Jairo explained, was supposed to have a bunker.

As the boys grew older, the realities of the war grew closer. Although they were only 9, Inez feared the boys could be recruited into the military.

“We had seen boys,” Jairo said, “who were 13 or 14 carrying guns. Our aunt didn’t want that to happen to us.”

After the twins’ grandmother died in 1985, Inez packed up her belongings and moved to Costa Mesa. The boys came soon after that.

Pedro and Jairo Arceyut are sitting in the Estancia dugout after practice, watching the sun drop over the horizon while a steady wind blows in over the outfield fence.

They’re wasting daylight, time they would like to be spending in the batting cage just behind them. They’re in the cages every day at sunrise, getting in some extra batting practice.

“We put in time here,” Jairo said. “There are a lot of guys on our team who do it. They want to play.”

Since moving to Costa Mesa, the brothers have excelled at sports. Jairo was an all-league cornerback in football last fall, and Pedro was a backup defensive back.

Baseball is their strongest sport. Jairo, a left-hander, pitches. Pedro, a right-hander, catches.

They played on the junior varsity baseball team last season before being promoted to the varsity this season.

This was supposed to be a rebuilding season for the Eagles, who lost all of their starters to graduation. But the play of the Arceyuts and other young players has the Eagles, who are playing in the Pride of the Coast tournament this week, contending for a Pacific Coast League title.

Following Monday’s 12-2 tournament loss to Brea-Olinda, Jairo, who bats third, was hitting about .425 with 13 stolen bases in 14 attempts. As a pitcher, he is 4-3 with a save.

Pedro bats fifth and is hitting .430. His three-run homer gave the Eagles a come-from-behind victory over Calvary Chapel two weeks ago.

Troxel says the twins have college potential. Jairo has a moderate fastball, but his good curve and knuckleball have flashed signs of brilliance. Pedro is throwing out would-be base-stealers at a steady clip.

“It would be cool to go on to college,” Pedro said, “and we could play against each other.”

But before college, Pedro and Jairo want to return to Nicaragua. It’s safe to go. The fighting stopped in the 1980s, and a new government took over in 1990s.

They say they will go back to Managua, see some old friends and perhaps find their father.

“We would like to go back,” Pedro said. “We really want to see our friends.”

And what will they tell them about the last eight years of their life?

“We will bring all our baseball stuff with us to show them, all the pictures and stuff,” Pedro said. “We’ll show them our football stuff too. They don’t even know what football is there.”